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This book aims to answer two simple questions: what is it to want and what is it to intend? Because of the breadth of contexts in which the relevant phenomena are implicated and the wealth of views that have attempted to account for them, providing the answers is not quite so simple. Doing so requires an examination not only of the relevant philosophical theories and our everyday practices, but also of the rich empirical material that has been provided by work in social and developmental psychology.The investigation is carried out in two parts, dedicated to wanting and intending respectively. Wanting is analysed as optative attitudinising, a basic form of subjective standard-setting at the core of compound states such as 'longings', 'desires', 'projects' and 'whims'. The analysis is developed in the context of a discussion of Moore-paradoxicality and deepened through the examination of rival theories, which include functionalist and hedonistic conceptions as well as the guise-of-the-good view and the pure entailment approach, two views popular in moral psychology.In the second part of the study, a disjunctive genetic theory of intending is developed, according to which intentions are optative attitudes on which, in one way or another, the mark of deliberation has been conferred. It is this which explains intention's subjection to the requirements of practical rationality. Moreover, unlike wanting, intending turns out to be dependent on normative features of our life form, in particular on practices of holding responsible.The book will be of particular interest to philosophers and psychologists working on motivation, goals, desire, intention, deliberation, decision and practical rationality.

They explore Plato's dialogue, looking at questions of how philosophy and sophistry relate, both on a methodological and on a thematic level.While many of the contributing authors argue for a sharp distinction between sophistry and philosophy, this is contested by others.

The contributions of philosophers and psychologists establish a fruitful dialogue, so that readers realize that disciplinary divisions are overcome through dialogue and the common object of inquiry: the way human beings reflect and act in their everyday experiences.

Drawing on the pragmatist tradition of semiotic of Peirce and Morris, this book traces the development of the logical categories of language to the more primitive sign levels of natural events and signals. The concluding chapters discuss the unique features introduced by spoken natural languages.